Atlantic City’s beach bars could come under noise regulations again under a new bill currently before Governor Chris Christie.
The bars were formerly under the city’s municipal noise regulations, but were exempted when the state took over the Atlantic City Tourism District, which includes the beaches.
Atlantic City’s state Sen. Jim Whelan, who co-sponsored the bill, said the bill simply restores the former noise regulations.
“There are people who live along the Boardwalk,” Whelan told the Press of Atlantic City. “No one’s saying we’re not having beach bars. No one’s saying there’s not going to be music at the beach bars or that they’d have to shut down at 9 or 10. We’re saying there should be a reasonable standard here.”
Noise complaints have come from condominium complexes near the bars, the Press reported.
The bill passed the state Senate on Thursday and has now gone to Christie for his signature. The bill would remove the exemption Atlantic City beach bars received from local noise regulations and place them under city noise rules.
Whelan was one of the original sponsors of bills granting the exemptions, but said they were made because a former city administration would not enforce city codes in the city tourism district. The regulations were then supposed to be passed onto the state Casino Reinvestment Development Authority that runs the district for enforcement.
“It was supposed to be a two-step process, and we kind of dropped the ball on the second step,” Whelan told the Press. “The first step was to more or less exempt beach bars from regulation by the city, because former Mayor Lorenzo Langford said the city wasn’t going to do it. But the second step never got done. … Casinos objected with the absurd argument that they should be unregulated.”
Under an agreement, the CRDA would purchase sound-measuring equipment, but the city would then be in charge of using it for enforcement, according to the Press.
In a statement, current Atlantic City Mayor Don Guardian said that “Having noise control back under the city’s purview is a good thing.”
“Atlantic City is demonstrating we can regulate our own issues,” Guardian said. “As mayor of a tourism town, I know the importance of working together with businesses to find common sense solutions to any potential issues that may arise. By having these responsibilities returned to the city, we will have that flexibility.”
